An Outstanding school overcoming Performance Management paperwork

An Outstanding school overcoming Performance Management paperwork

Deputy headteacher Jeff Miller had one overarching reason to choose an online school improvement planning system.

“Quite simply, I didn’t want to do staff performance management on paper,” says Jeff, who is deputy head at the ‘outstanding’ 1,000 pupil Oakwood Park Grammar School in Maidstone, Kent.

“As the person charged with performance management my head comes to me and asks me how staff are doing in their performance appraisals and I can use an online system to give him an instant picture. Without an online system it was a case of me roaming around the school for a couple of weeks collecting pieces of paper.”

After demoing a number of systems Jeff chose Bluewave.SWIFT School Edition. This is an online system that connects information and documents across self-evaluation, school inspection reports, strategic planning, professional development and performance appraisal. Schools can then drive improvement processes and keep ahead of ever-changing accountability and inspection requirements while saving time and cutting costs. The school has been using the system since May 2008.

Jeff is using the performance management element of the system at the moment although he does have ambitions to use other functions in the future.

The performance management element of Bluewave.SWIFT School Edition allows Jeff and his headteacher to see where each of the 120 Oakwood staff members are in the performance appraisal cycle. Jeff can see information such as whether the headteacher has approved appraisals, details of lesson observations of each staff member, when the next interim reviews are scheduled and how each staff member is doing against the teacher professional standards. Staff members can see their individual appraisal records and feed their observations and evidence into them.

The recent change in the teacher professional standards in September 2012, when the number of standards were drastically reduced, could have created an enormous extra workload for Jeff and his team. However, with the Bluewave system the evidence that staff built up against the previous standards were automatically mapped to the new standards, so there was no need to start again.

“The system has been very good with tracking the changing teacher standards,” says Jeff. “It has made it easy to link the teaching standards to the objectives that you are setting staff.”

“It does what Bluewave.SWIFT says it does very well,” he says. “I also like it that when I give them feedback about the system, the company takes things on board. The product doesn’t stand still - it is always in evolution.”

“Very simply I made the best choice based on price and functionality.”

For further information, please visit our website – www.bluewaveswift.co.uk or contact us on 0845 4900 447, info@bluewaveswift.com

85% of schools maintain or improve their Ofsted Grade!

85% of schools maintain or improve their Ofsted Grade!

We (Bluewave) have gathered data regarding eighty schools that have been using Bluewave.SWIFT for a number of years. The only criteria are that these eighty schools have experienced at least two inspections within the study period. We have focussed only on ‘overall effectiveness’ for the purpose of this study and the figures relate to judgements made following the school’s second inspection unless otherwise stated.

We don’t assume these schools improve solely as a result of using Bluewave.SWIFT. Our preferred view is that these schools would have improved anyway and as part of their leadership and management approach, they choose the very best tools to help them get there.

Our summary conclusion therefore, based on the evidence gathered, is that schools with the capability and capacity to improve are more likely to do so using Bluewave.SWIFT.

Read the excerpt from Ofsted statistics and the comparison figures below:

Management Information: new schools inspection framework

This management information provides an overview of the outcomes of the inspections which took place under section 5 of the Education Act 2011 in the first three weeks of the new school inspection framework which began 1 January 2012. 

Table 1: The inspection judgements of schools inspected between 6 January and 20 January 2012 (percentage of schools)[1]

Click image to enlarge.

Percentages are rounded and do not always add exactly to 100.

Summary of Ofsted findings with Bluewave.SWIFT user comparisons.

·         Out of 348 schools inspected in the first 3 weeks of the new arrangements, 57% were judged good or outstanding in their overall effectiveness. (Ofsted)

·         64% of schools were judged good or outstanding. (Bluewave.SWIFT)

·         Eight per cent of schools were judged outstanding in their overall effectiveness, achievement of pupils and quality of teaching judgements.

·         24% of schools were judged outstanding compared with 8% after their first inspection – an improvement of 16%.

·         Thirteen per cent of schools were judged inadequate in their overall effectiveness and of these seven per cent were given a notice to improve whilst the remaining schools were placed into special measures.

·         3% of schools were judged inadequate – no change compared with the first inspection but the schools were different.

·         All but seven schools had a previous section 5 inspection. Only 19% of schools improved, 50% stayed the same and over a quarter (28%) declined on their previous inspection. This compares with 34% improving, 47% staying the same and 19% declining at inspection during 2010/11.

·         36% of schools improved their grading

·         49% of schools maintained their grading

·         15% of schools experienced a lower grading

Additional Information (compiled by Bluewave)

The following is a summary of Ofsted judgements achieved by the eighty schools using Bluewave.SWIFT and includes comparisons with Ofsted inspection data from the period September 2005 to August 2011

Summary  of data relating to the eighty schools across two consecutive inspections and comparisons with Ofsted data (Overall Effectiveness)
1	Percentage of schools that maintained or improved their Ofsted Grade	85%
2	Percentage of schools that improved their Ofsted Grade	36%
3	Percentage of schools that improved to achieve 'Outstanding'	18%
4	Percentage of schools judged to be 'Good' or 'Outstanding' in their second inspection	64%
5	Percentage of schools graded Outstanding in first inspection	8%
	Percentage of schools graded Outstanding in second inspection	24%
	Average percentage of inspections graded 'Outstanding' - Ofsted Data (Sept 2005 - Aug 2011)	14%
	Lowest percentage of inspections graded 'Outstanding' - Ofsted Data (Sept 2005 - Aug 2011) - '05-'06 & '10-'11	11%
	Highest percentage of inspections graded 'Outstanding' - Ofsted Data (Sept 2005 - Aug 2011) - '08-'09	19%
6	Percentage of schools graded 'Inadequate' in second inspection	3%
	Average percentage of inspections graded 'Inadequate' - Ofsted Data (Sept 2005 - Aug 2011)	6%
	Lowest percentage of inspections graded 'Inadequate' - Ofsted Data (Sept 2005 - Aug 2011) - '08-'09	4%
	Highest percentage of inspections graded 'Inadequate' - Ofsted Data (Sept 2005 - Aug 2011) - '05-'06 & '09-'10	8%

The full Ofsted report can be found here: http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/official-statistics-maintained-school-inspections-and-outcomes

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Continuity in the new Professional Teacher Standards - Bluewave.SWIFT

Continuity in the new Professional Teacher Standards

One of the challenges faced by people when they encounter change is having to ‘start things from scratch’. Understandably, people may be forgiven for asking ‘why change?’ and ‘why so often?’ A good example of this is the Ofsted SEF which changed fairly regularly and was then apparently abandoned in July 2011 only for a new framework to be devised and advised in January 2012. A more recent example is the new Professional Standards for teachers.

The new Teacher Standards come into force in September 2012 but is it really the case that teachers must wait until then before using them? A more relevant question perhaps is ‘what happens to all my evidence from the past?’ Having invested so much of their time in generating an evidence base for one format, is it really fair to ask teachers to do it all again?

Answers to these questions are the reason why Bluewave.SWIFT exists; leaders in education will recognise there must be continuity and succession planning if we are to ensure the burden of bureaucracy does not impinge on the core business of a school. In other words, administration must be made easier.

Teachers using Bluewave.SWIFT have ‘future-proofed’ their evidence. Simply storing their evidence and documents in a unique way ensures that it all comes to the surface in the right place in the future, regardless of what the next version of teaching standards looks like. This method works for all staff and indeed for the whole school meaning that everyone can have a truly lifelong record of progress all in one place, all interconnected to Performance Management and to Continuing Professionaldevelopment (CPD)

The Teacher Standards 2012 are built into in Bluewave.SWIFT alongside the current teaching standards. Headteacher standards are also included as well as Teaching Assistant standards and the National Occupational Standards for support staff.

Click here to see a video of how you can evaluate against the new Teacher Standards